Manny Waks has called for the resignations of four senior rabbis found to have attempted to interfere with the administration of justice in the way they dealt with sexual abuse claims.
Photograph: Mal Fairclough/AAP

Senior rabbis have been described by a child sexual abuse survivor as a “law unto themselves” and urged to resign from the peak body of Orthodox rabbis in Australia after being found guilty of contempt of court for pressuring a community member to bypass secular authorities.

Earlier in December, the New South Wakes court of appeal upheld a decision of the supreme court of NSW, which found that four rabbis from the Rabbinic Council of Australia and New Zealand including its president Rabbi Moshe Gutnick were guilty of criminal contempt of court after attempting to interfere with the administration of justice.

The court found Gutnick along with Rabbi Eli Schlanger, Rabbi Yehoram Ulman and Rabbi Michael Chriqui had pressured a member of their community, Reuven Barukh, not to attend a secular court to resolve a commercial business dispute and to instead have the case heard in accordance with Jewish religious law at a Beth Din.

A survivor of sexual abuse who exposed crimes against children that occurred within the secretive Jewish Yeshivah community, Manny Waks, said the rabbis attempts to circumvent civil law meant the organisation could not be trusted to properly handle serious matters like allegations of child sexual abuse.

Waks is the chief executive officer of Kol v’Oz, which advocates for survivors of abuse in Jewish communities around the world, and he has called for “a complete rebuilding of the Orthodox rabbinate” and for the implicated leadership of the Rabbinic Council of Australia and New Zealand to resign.

“The court has found the rule of law in Australia is being disregarded by religious leaders including by Australia’s most senior rabbi, Rabbi Gutnick,” Waks told Guardian Australia.

“They’re showing a lack of transparency and accountability in not following the rule of law and so their public pronouncements about working with authorities moving forward rings hollow. Because they’re not working with the authorities. They’re not acting appropriately.”

In his decision, Justice John Sackar said he regarded the improper pressure as “a serious affront and challenge to the integrity of the administration of justice in New South Wales”.

“The threats in context were to assert and force the primacy of the Beth Din and its exclusivity over Mr Barukh as against a secular court, with serious religious sanctions to be imposed if that primacy and exclusivity were not observed,” he found.

“These threats had an undoubted effect on Mr Barukh in particular and no doubt members of his family … freedom of religion and one of its close allies freedom of speech are vital in any democracy. However, the former should not be used as a tool of oppression so as to exert pressure on a putative litigant. Nor should the former be used as a means of inflicting serious reputational, hurtful and humiliating pressure as a retaliation for a refusal to acknowledge and obey a religious body’s alleged exclusive authority to the exclusion of a secular court.”

While Sackar did halve the rabbis’ financial penalties, he also ordered them to pay all legal costs for the appeal.

Waks said it was “inexplicable” that all of the rabbis remained full members of the council following the finding of guilt by the court and rejection of their appeal.

“It’s astonishing,” he said. “The status quo is untenable”.

He said it was also disappointing that no member of the Rabbinic Council of Australia and New Zealand had condemned the rabbis’ actions or sought to hold them publicly to account.

Instead, the Rabbinical Council of NSW responded to the NSW court of appeal decision by saying it “may impact on religious freedom in Australia”.

The chief executive of the Rabbinical Council of Australia and New Zealand, Rabbi Dr Ben Elton, told Jewish news service J-Wire that members of the executive of the council were working together to discuss the contempt of court issue.